An Interview Series from The Christian Post with Some of My Thoughts
Before we get to the series, it’s a bit of a challenge to find younger preachers in Gospel ministry under the age of 40, or so, who are in the pulpit week after week. This list of millennial pastors that I compiled last year wasn’t that long, considering that the United States has over 300,000 churches.
Desparately Seeking Pastors for Millennials
To be clear, the reason for this post is not to violate the Medum Rules for Spam, because the purpose here is to find those next generation preachers and pastors. Pastors are an essential part of the present and future of the church and how all of that makes a difference for faith communities.
I know that while the shape and form of the church is dramatically changing because of technology and the new reality with COVID-19 virus, I’m of the persuasion that pastors and preachers will be needed. Just replaying audios and videos from preachers of the past generations will be less and less effective. In a digital world, we are accumulating and aggregating more content than ever. On the one hand, our humanity hasn’t changed all that much for centuries, but cultures and societies do change with almost every generation, and thus the need for new preachers for each generation.
To say it another way — articles abound about engaging the next generation known as Millennials (loosely defined as people born between 1980 and 2000, that’s 14-34 years old) in the marketplace and workplace as well as in the realms of religion and faith; pundits and experts have published many ideas and theories and trends about their behaviors and preferences.
But where are the churches and pastors actually effective in contextualizing faith for the Millennials? If finding a list of churches for millennials was hard for me, it’s too hard. If it’s not on the Internet, does it exist? 🙂
What little there is, with real examples, comes from years ago, in this list of interviews from years ago.
Christian Post’s Interviews with Younger Pastors
About the 6-part series in The Christian Post from 2013, the editor noted this in his introductory notes—
In a season where every day seems to bring a new assault on traditional biblical views, there are nonetheless a whole new generation of young pastors preaching orthodox biblical Christianity and seeing their churches grow exponentially because of it. The Christian Post has picked but a few of scores of pastors enjoying the favor of God in this way, in an effort to find out what about the Gospel resonates in today’s generation.
Pastors interviewed are under 40, most, but not all, in urban settings and are attracting Christians over a wide age spectrum, including Millennials and Generation X. These pastors uphold traditional biblical views of family and morality, yet attract young people and are gaining national reputations.
Levi Lusko of Fresh Life Church
Matt Chandler of The Village Church
Dharius Daniels of Change Church
Evangelist Will Graham
David Platt of McLean Bible Church
Steven Furtick of Elevation Church
There’s a couple of other lists floating out there..
Most Influential Christians Under 40
Here’s a list of the most influential young Christians shaking our world today. (Beliefnet, June 2016)
Youngest Large-Church Pastors in North America
Still Thinking..
Well, um, what does the future hold? This research from Barna Group and the creators of the Alpha course offers some disappointing news regarding the 20-somethings and 30-somethings now on deck to carry on the faith: nearly half (47%) of practicing Christian millennials — churchgoers who consider religion an important part of their lives — believe that evangelism is wrong.
Can you believe that? It’s a part of many faiths to be sharing about their faith and inviting others to check it out. There’s usually no coercion. Degrees of persuasion, or effective persuasion at that, can vary, yes.
Another conversation starting up, this September. The Millennial Pastor is branching out beyond the written word and into the world of podcasting! Pastor Erik and Pastor Courtenay are starting a podcast!
Yes, this is a pastor in Canada, and apparently they received a grant, which means some money and funds, to run this podcast. It will be an audio portion attached to that blog. Would you believe it, he’s got 1600+ likes on his Facebook page, too? And over 10,000 followers on the blog?
This topic is still nascent. We need more solid, ethical and moral pastors, if the future of faith will endure. For the faithful, it will endure. The open question is whether it will endure in America, or will the USA become post-Christian with more and more dead churches like it is in Europe.
